Mexico Imposes Travel Restrictions on Peru to Help Curb Migration

The migration crisis is not just giving headaches to the US, but Mexico as well, and the country is seeking to ease this problem by imposing travel restrictions on people from certain countries, particularly Peru.

Peruvian nationals will be required to apply for a visa to enter Mexico, according to the country's official gazette on Friday. This was announced amid a recent surge of migrants from Peru and these travel restrictions will begin to take effect in 15 days.

As Reuters noted, Mexico had previously eliminated visa requirements for citizens of Peru back in 2012. People were allowed to stay in the country for up to 180 days, but migrants trying to get to the US-Mexico border have been using this to their advantage, thus leading to the massive spike in Peruvian migrants coming into the North American country.

There has been a "substantial" increase in the number of Peruvians entering Mexico "whose profile does not fit that of the genuine visitor or tourist and present inconsistencies in their documentation," said the Mexico Interior Ministry. However, this is not the first time Mexico has done this, as they also imposed travel restrictions on other countries whose citizens are trying to get to the US.

Currently, Mexico has been diverting a lot of migrants and impeding their attempts to head to the US-Mexico border in order to discourage them. This is often done by catching migrants and sending them by bus to the south, near the Mexico-Guatemala border.

Peru Migrants Trying To Get To Mexico Before Visa Restrictions Get Implemented

There is still a 15-day period before the visa restrictions will begin to take effect, but for Peruvian migrants trying to reach the US-Mexico border, it has now become a race against time as they must now get to Mexico before that even happens.

One of these migrants, Julia Paredes, spoke with the Associated Press, She is currently making a perilous land journey to make it to Mexico in less than 15 days.

"I had to treat it as an emergency," she told the AP. She previously failed to make it to the US last month after US Border Patrol agents busted a smuggling operation that tried to get her and 100 others through the border. Despite this, she is not giving up.

US Applauds Mexico Imposing Visa Restrictions on Peru

Meanwhile, the United States was quite happy with Mexico's latest moves to try and curb the migrants trying to get to the country.

During a meeting of top diplomats from about 20 countries in the Western hemisphere this week in Guatemala, several senior US officials lauded Mexico over the move, as well as its crackdown on air travel from Peru. US officials also called the visa requirements "an important tool to jointly confront illegal migration."

Mexico previously did this to Venezuela. restricting air travel from the country, and according to ABC News. the number of Venezuelans coming into Mexico plummeted in January 2022. However, this only made things worse overall as more Venezuelans tried going through the dangerous Darien Gap with the air travel restrictions being implemented.

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Rick Martin

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